Tom Coronel said his battle with John Filippi in the final laps of the second race of the TCR Europe series at Spa was ‘good fun’.
Coronel, who returned to the paddock for the first time since the opening round of the season at Paul Ricard, took a pair of second places in rounds nine and ten of the season behind double winner Mikel Azcona.
The Boutsen Ginion Racing driver made the most of several drivers – including Mike Halder and Pepe Oriola – who were on a different tyre strategy struggling late on in the race before he overtook Filippi on the final lap for second.
“It was good racing, even though I made one mistake when Azcona and Filippi could overtake me and then it took me too long to overtake them again,” said Coronel.
“I had really good speed, but that interfered with my chances of a win. We started from P9 and I could see there was a big mess in front.
“It’s typical of the style; wait a little bit and see how much benefit you can get out of the mistakes other people are making.”
Dutchman Coronel, as like with the fast-charging Ascona, chose not to enter race two with wets all round and as like yesterday, it proved to be the correct decision as they went on to claim the top two positions.
“I saw the track was drying and I knew that the guys who were on full wet tyres were going to be in trouble, so I knew that wasn’t going to be a problem,” explained Coronel.
“I was counting, P3 will work out and finally in the last laps I had some good fights with Filippi and he overshot a little bit at the hairpin and I dived up the inside.
“Okay, there was a little tap, but I think it was fair Touring Car racing and it was good fun.”
Coronel will now contest the final round of the season which is set to take place at Jarama in Spain, in a fortnight’s time.